What Have We Become
by CamsthiSky
Summary: "He feels cursed. At moments like this, when he's at his lowest, when he's mourning the people that keep falling around him again and again, Dick feels like maybe the world should just leave him alone. Leave him to suffer alone and away from people he can hurt. And who can hurt him." Spoilers for Titans Rebirth #15


**Major Spoilers for Titans Rebirth Issue 15. I'm sure this'll be AU after #16 comes out, but I was having feelings and then I made it worse, so. Here ya go.**

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He doesn't find the letter until hours after, and he can't bring himself to read it. He just clutches it in his hands as Alfred looks his chest over.

They're in Titans Tower. Dick's sitting on the edge of his bed, elbows on his knees, head bowed, dressed in only sweats as Alfred pokes and prods what used to be a gaping hole in Dick's chest. There's nothing there, though. Not anymore. Because Wally fixed him. Wally saved him.

Alfred sits back with a sigh. "I do not believe there will be any lasting effects, but just to make sure—"

"No." The word slips out before Dick even really registers he's said it, but he doesn't take it back. He knows what Alfred wants to do. He wants to bring Dick back to the Cave. Get him in plain view of his family. So that Dick will break down and start rebuilding himself instead of staying in this numbed sort of shock he's settled in.

But Dick doesn't want that right now. He's comfortable in this numbness, and he doesn't want to break down quite yet. Because breaking down would mean dealing with it. And that's something he _absolutely_ can't handle right now.

"Master Dick—" Alfred starts to say, but Dick shakes his head, and Alfred cuts off. The butler heaves another heavy sigh and settles a gentle hand on Dick's shoulder. "Very well, then. Would you like me to stay here? Or perhaps send one of your siblings? Your father?"

"No," Dick says again, but it's weaker this time. Less sure. "Not right now."

"You shouldn't be alone right now," Alfred tells him gently. "You are going through something trying, and when has being alone ever helped you?"

"Bruce, then," Dick concedes, because he can't find it in him to face is little brothers or sister. Can't even find it in him to face his friends. And he still can't look at Alfred in the eye. He messed up again, and _this_ time, there's no fixing it. And in the end, Bruce knows Dick the best. He won't try to talk him out of his numbness like anybody else would. He'd just sit with Dick. "Can you get Bruce?"

Alfred squeezes his shoulder lightly and then lets go. Dick almost mourns the touch. "Of course, Master Dick. I'll be back in a few minutes."

Figures, Dick thinks as Alfred walks out the door. Figures that Alfred would have already anticipated exactly this and cut the time by bringing Bruce with him. Alfred always does have a way of knowing exactly what they all need when they need it.

Dick turns the letter over in his hands, thumb tracing over his name written across the front. The handwriting is distinct, leaving no doubt as to who it's from. It's still sealed, too, because Dick can't manage to make himself open it. To read what may as well be Wally's last words.

There's a knock on Dick's door, but Bruce doesn't wait for Dick to answer before he's walking on. He sits next to Dick on the edge of the bed and stays quiet. Before long, Dick finds himself leaning into Bruce's weight and laying his head on Bruce's shoulder.

"He saved my life," Dick whispers, something heavy and terrible and _ugly_ settling in his chest. Something that he'd felt _so many_ times before and has never wanted to feel again.

He'd felt it when his parents fell to their deaths, when Jason was killed, when he thought Bruce was dead while lost in the time stream, when he'd failed to save Damian, and last when Tim had died on them, too. And now—

"My best friend, Bruce," Dick says, unbidden tears starting to prick at his eyes. He tries to blink them away but his breathing gets heavier and before he knows it, his shoulders are shaking with silent sobs. "I don't understand," he whispers, breath hitching. "I don't understand why this keeps happening."

He feels cursed. At moments like this, when he's at his lowest, when he's mourning the people that keep falling around him again and again, Dick feels like maybe the world should just leave him alone. Leave him to suffer alone and away from people he can hurt.

And who can hurt him.

He absolutely hates this feeling. Where his heart twists and twists in his chest until it's twisted too far and it _breaks._ He hates that he has to _keep_ feeling it, because the world can't seem to give him a break. His parents, Jason, Bruce, Damian, Tim. And now Wally. First almost his entire family and now his best friend?

Bruce shifts a little and then he's wrapping Dick up in his arms, and Dick is slipping from the numbness and he feels like he's breaking in two. That ugliness in his chest grows until it's spilling from the seams and Dick doesn't even feel _human_ anymore. It comes out in cries and sobs, and Bruce just holds him, rocks him, pets his hair back, all the while murmuring quiet reassurances as Dick shatters.

Wally's gone. And Dick can't figure out how to _be_ anymore. And he's not sure he ever will. Not with his best friend in the entire world gone.


End file.
